Government plans to privatise the visa application system could provide those able to pay more with premium services, costing up to 3000 jobs and put people’s private information at risk.
Home affairs minister Peter Dutton said the proposal is to modernise Australia’s visa system to cater for the growing number of applicants, with the department seeking a private-sector partner to design a “user-pays” application and approval system which has limited human involvement.
Greens senator Nick McKim said the proposal could see the integrity of Australia’s visa system suffer with “access to Australia packaged up and sold to the highest bidder”.